Terrence Jones

I grew up before cable television, when a remote control was, “Son, get your ass off the couch and change the channel.” The number of channels could be counted on two hands. So, many of my fond memories were from watching infomericals. Tom Vu was one and will always have a special place in my heart, while the other one was Billy Blanks and his Tae Bo. That was the OG. Seriously, everything now should pay homage and pay royalties to Blanks. Anyways, after more than 20 years, Tae Bo is still going strong. There are fitness centers and classes all across the county and Billy Blanks still has, not only an operational website, but one that looks legit. Which brings me to Zach Randolph, aka Z-Bo. He’s so OG that his friends…in middle school….named him Z-Bo after Deebo. This is his 18th season in the NBA, yet, like Tae Bo, is still going strong. Last night, Z-Bo went:

PTS

REB

AST

STL

BLK

TOV

3PT

FG

FT

26

12

2

1

0

4

3/6

11/23

1/2

He played 32 minutes. So, that thing about the Kings going young. Yeah…..Z-Bo has actually played 32, 32, and 28 minutes the past three games. But he did not see the court the two games before that. He’s only a streaming option or a DFS play in the right matchup. He must’ve been licking his lips when he saw that Dante Cunningham would be guarding him last night. He went so OG that he knocked him out of the game with injury. I’m getting all nostalgic and will try one of the Tae Bo workouts. Shit, I shouldn’t have done that. Still effective, like Z-Bo.

This week researchers in China cloned two monkeys using the nuclear-transfer technique employed to make Dolly the sheep. Sadly, we can not clone a healthy version of DeMarcus Cousins. Before his injury, he averaged 25.6 points, 13 rebounds, and 5.2 assists. Only three players (Wilt Chamberlain, Elgin Baylor, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) in NBA history had ever averaged at least 25 points, 13 rebounds, and 5 assists. The impact in our leagues will be instantaneous and twelve of our teams never will be the same.

Here is how the action went down in Week 12 across our 12 RCL Leagues:

… A Long Ass post trade deadline analysis (couldn’t come up with a word that rhymes with automobiles). I’ll dive deep into a couple of trades (Boogie and Nerlens Noel). I’ll also cover the much hyped but somewhat boring (thanks to Boston, Indiana & Chicago!) trade deadline that has come and gone.

Oh and by the way, if you’d rather just listen to an analysis instead of read and see some copy/pasted stats from NBA.COM, just go ahead and listen to JB’s podcast.

Injury karma, man… The injury gods love to play with our emotions, and they really jacked with the Bucks last night! First with the good – The Duchess returned to the court with great fanfare! Sooooo good to get Khris Middleton back, after it was initially thought he might miss the entire 2016-17 season. The Duchess got 15 minutes off the bench for 5/2/2/0/1 on 2-5 shooting.

Looked pretty healthy out there! He’s going to be on a 15-20 minute limit until the All-Star Break, but that’s in a mere week, so we could see him getting unleashed sooner than later. Then on the flip side, a mere 2 quarters after the long-awaited season debut of Middleton, Jabari Parker suffered a scary knee injury, and is scheduled for an MRI today. From all reports it didn’t look good (I don’t like to watch injury highlights…), and it’s the same knee he tore his ACL in his rookie year, so we’re all holding our breath here. Would be a big shame to see him miss a lot of time after putting together this breakout campaign… Well, let’s be all happy and pie in the sky the rest of the daily notes today! Here’s what went down on a busy Wednesday night in fantasy basketball:

Fantasy owners feel the same way! All my non-Parsons teams are doing WAY better than where I wasted a damned pick on this schmohawk in the middle rounds! Ugh, this has been one of my worst calls in my Razzball tenure, as Parsons’ knees have made him a shell of his former, dynamic self when he was finishing up 15-16 with Dallas. It’s always a gamble to draft a guy off a major surgery – one could almost say it’s like trying to win the lottery! And as of yet, I haven’t won millions of dollars in the Mega Millions, so I shouldn’t have gone for it here! I still think there could be a nice finish post-ASB once he has that full off-week to ice up those knees, but after 8/2/2 and that labradoodle shot Friday, followed by a DNP-rest Saturday, I feel like I need to be flogged in the Razzball city square. At least he’s played 21+ minutes the past two games…? Is that all I can really find positive in this?! He’s involved in fun social media drama, can we make that a stat cat?! D’Angelo Russell, first rounder! Here’s what else went down over the weekend in fantasy hoops action:

A number of injuries to key players (at least fantasy wise) are starting to crop up again. Hassan Whiteside is questionable for Friday vs CHI. Deron Williams is the same for tonight’s game (2nd half of a b2b game) vs OKC. Anthony Davis is showing how his body is truly made of glass and it seems like if he’s not a DNP, he’s missing quarters due to injuries. It appears like he re-aggravated that thigh bruise and he could be shut for a game or 2 to give it time to completely heal. Al Horford, although listed as probable for tomorrow’s game vs ORL, seems to have some groin issues.

If any of these guys miss a game or two to end the week, it could open up some playing time for back ups and/or opposing players to produce above their averages.

Oh man, what a fun day this is for Razzball Basketball! Let’s start with our big announcement we’re making later today – I’ve teased it a few times, but it’s coming this afternoon! We’ve got a special post going up today that is going to: Blow. Your. Mind. I’ll just leave it at this – it involved robots and very short shorts…

On top of THAT, what a fun night of hoops on Humpday! We had epic drama with the Kings somehow beating THE King (in Cleveland no less!), yet another tripdub for Russ, but then a late night wonder with my boyfriend Ivica Zubac having another awesome game! My preseason darling looked further away than ever for minutes when he barely got run in preseason games, but he just kept his head down and powered through some D-League stints and a handful of junk time minutes here and there until the Lakers finally started unleashing him. Had the 11/13/1/1/3 line 3 games ago against the Nugs, then after low minutes for two games, exploded again last night for 12/10/2/0/3.

He’s just so big and so fundamental! He did only shoot 5-15 from the field (a few “misses” were on consecutive putback attempts though…) and had 4 TO, but hit 2-2 FT and typically should be a true 8-cat guy (no treys). As I mentioned on the Pod last week, in the D-League he shot 57.8% from the field, 82.9% from the FT line, and had a 15.6/9.7/1.3/0.2/1.0 line in 13 games at 30 MPG. I mean, it’s not “epic”, but he’s still only 19 and looks like he could turn into Jonas Valanciunas with D-stats. With ZuBlock showing off his potential and our big announcement today, I’m like a rabid Beatles fan this morning!

After pimping him hard as a possible second-half sleeper in the preseason (I initially ranked him like 160 or something, but then they signed Tarik Black and never played Zubac in the preseason, so I cut him out of my top 200), it’s 100% time to add him if you need a big. It might be bumpy for minutes, but the Lakers have fallen to 16-33 and it’s time to keep the youth developing. Here’s what else went down in fantasy basketball last night:

PS – Podcast will be out tomorrow morning – we are recording later today, just a day behind. Can’t wait to gloat about taking back the 30-point challenge lead!

Damn, what a game in Miami! There’s a sentence I wouldn’t have thought I’d say in 2017… Dion Waiters playing like an absolute boss and is 100% must own! Ditto…

Capping off an unbelievable game for Waiters (33/5/4/1/0 on 13-20 shooting with 6 treys), was this game-winning trey that will likely be the Heat’s biggest shot this season.

Take that, 14-15’s NBA title-winning Warriors! Revenge is a dish best served 1.5 years cold! Crazy win in Miami for the upset, and giving Waiters an encore of his career-high 33-points against the Bucks with a matching effort. I obviously don’t think he’s going to become a 30+ point scorer here on out, but the opportunity is there for him to jack up his shots. Absolutely add him everywhere – even if he is a hot ThrAGNOF – then if he goes ice cold, you just drop him! Why threes ain’t got no face! He should chip in a couple dimes as well, but even after a high-volume 25-39 FG back-to-back set, he’s still barely over 40% shooting from the field this season, and he’s a terrible FT shooter (65.2%). Coupled with 2+ TO a game, and he’s pretty metrics-unfriendly. I would still add him everywhere, which I tried to do yesterday, until Slim decided to be an absolute tool and beat me to it while recording the Pod yesterday. Well, joke’s on you Slim, you missed this game last night because it’s Daily – Tomorrow in the RCL!

What an incredible night in the NBA last night with two huge game-winners in the final seconds, plus for a little Razzball-specific incredibleness, we’ve got a huge announcement coming this week! Let’s just say it involves fortune-telling and amazingness… That’s right, we hired Miss Cleo! Wait, I think it’s “too soon” to make that joke… Anywho, here’s what else happened last night in fantasy basketball action:

Ya know, playing a typical “bad” team can help cure all ills, but then there’s playing a New York team that goes full Poppycock… To kick off MLK day, the Knicks continued their epic collapse, by being forced to start doofy Ron Baker and Mind Games Koozie Mints. I’m kinda guessing at that second guy, I don’t know why Razzball isn’t linking to his name though! It’s about right! Baker got 22 minutes of 12/3/1/2/0 and was OK, and I guess Mindaugas Kuzminskas was OK too for 14/5/2/2/0 in 38 minutes, and well, the Hawks only beat this make-shift roster by 1, so there’s that! But the big thing to watch in this game (for me) was Dennis Schroder, who is off two horrid games where he got out-minutesed by Malcolm Delaney. Fortunately Das German broke out of his funk, and went 28/3/3 on a mad hot 13-16 shooting with a trey.

The trey being the game winner! Still got 2 TO and no D stats, but hey, at least he kept another split-PG situation from developing. Already have seen to much of that in the NBA! It was an action-packed, holiday-filled day of basketball last night, so let’s daily notes it up!

You hate to see in sports when a guy gets hurt, then loses his starting spot once he’s back to action. Usually it’s for a youthful upside guy that takes off when given an expanded role, but don’t say that to Alex Smith… And it’s not like Matthew Dellavedova was some sort of entrenched starter either… Before we feel too bad for this guy, he just sold his life story into a movie. Crocodile Dundee 4 – Welcome to the NBA! The last one was written by someone in fantasy sports, gimme the green light, Hollywood! Delly returned from 5 games off with a bum hammy (due to all his storyline pitching to studios) to go 2/2/4/1/0 in 18 minutes off the bench. Taking the starting minutes like a bull by the horns (maybe I should’ve gone with “Buck” by the horns!), Malcolm Brogdon had a fire lit under him yesterday afternoon seeing the incumbent get back, posting a career-high 22 points on a 22/1/5/3/1 line with 2 treys.

Hitting his Js and taking it to the rack! Take that, Dundee! They actually overlapped a few minutes as well, and while I still don’t think Brogdon is going to keep ascending (and Delly was likely on a little bit of a leash), I kinda wish I got some Broggy shares. Alsoh, there was Disturbingly no Giannis Antetokounmpo who was down with the sickness, but someone needed to score a little more, and Malcolm stepped up! If he’s somehow still available in your 12ers (maybe he was cut for streaming with Delly coming back), I’d be sure and give him an add. But in 10ers it might get a little roster crunchy. Roster Crunchy – a new cereal from Patty General Mills! Here’s what else went down over a cold & snowy weekend of fantasy basketball action: